Equinox
by apple psyche
Summary: Gardenia was starting to regret going into Eterna forest for a midnight stroll.


**A/N: **WHAAAT DAISY ACTUALLY WROTE SOMETHING? And it seems to be longer than anything else I've ever really written. No that that's saying much. Well lalalala~ I'm off to dance with hairless Lovecraftian human-chimp hybrids. Arthur Jermyn called, he said he wants his grandmother back.

Written for pokefics at livejournal's **prompt #1: spooks**  
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Equinox**

Gardenia picked up the pace a little. She wasn't exactly sure when the feeling had started, but she was sure of it now. There was something behind her, no matter which way she turned, even backtracked, the hairs were raised on the back of her neck by an ominous presence that she couldn't shake off.

She was starting to regret going into Eterna forest for a midnight stroll; although it wasn't that a sudden flight of fancy had taken her - she had come to collect certain herbs that had special properties if picked in the Autumn Equinox's early morning hours before sunrise and could only be found if you knew where to look.

It was one thing finding them, but then getting back with this _not really there_ presence following her. Every time she turned around expecting some horrific being to be there behind her but there was nothing but forest scenery. She was really dreading having to walk back passed the Old Chateau to get home.

She broke into a jog, closing her eyes for a moment to try and stop the tears from forming, only to bump into a knee-high lump and fall flat on her face into the grass wet with dew. She lay there a moment in shock, too scared to turn around to see what she had tripped over lest it be _THE THING_.

"Okay," she thought, "I'm going to quickly look around and whatever it is that's there I'm ready to see it and then I'm going to run like hell."

She looked to see what was really behind her this time. A Leafeon was staring inquisitively back at her, the backside of it pinned under her legs. It looked slightly hurt that she had run over it.

"Oh," she said quietly, feeling quite defeated by her imagination, "It was just you there was it?"

The Leafeon merely wedged its way out of the hold from under her legs and walked passed her in the direction she had been going. When it was a few feet away it looked back at her, kept going, looked back, kept going, looked back again. Gardenia wondered if it wanted her to follow it. Unsure as she was, nevertheless, she got up and walked after it feeling a lot better now that she knew it was the thing she had felt was hanging around her. Briefly, she considered if it was worth trying to catch it, Leafeons were pretty rare in the wild, but she was so frazzled by the previous events of the night that she felt too downtrodden to be able to muster up the effort.

When she had caught a ways up with it, it stopped and turned around to look at her. She looked into its big brown eyes and was mildly hypnotised by them until she noticed something. It didn't seem to be look directly at her, more …just behind her. Straight away Gardenia felt the bone chilling _there's something behind you_ feeling return stubbornly, though unwelcomed. Then the Leafeon turned and kept walking onwards in the same direction. Gardenia ran after it then turned around. Nothing there. She was almost too scared to turn back around again in case it was in front of her, but she braved herself and continued after the Leafeon. It wasn't long before the Leafeon turned around again, and still, Gerdenia couldn't _quite_ tell if it was looking at her or behind her. Then it broke into a swift trot and she followed hurriedly looking back behind her frequently and then always scared to turn back to the front in case something had accumulated there while she was looking back.

It hadn't been a minute when the Leafeon slowed down to a stop and she realised they were located close to the short pathway to the Old Chateau.

And then she saw why the Leafeon had stopped. There was a shadowy figure standing between her and the exit of the forest, just off to the side of the Chateau. Gardenia froze. Looking back she remembered it as one of the most terrifying moments in her life. But right now she couldn't move or even breathe. She broke out into a cold sweat.

"This is it," she thought carefully as if even a thought might provoke something catastrophic, "I'm going to die. Right here. Right now."

She waited a few seconds. Then a few seconds more. All the time the figure didn't move, the Leafeon was watching it too but it didn't seem tense at all. Then it dawned on Gardenia that the figure looked somewhat familiar. And had a scarf billowing in the breeze.

Oh, how stupid she had been!

Nearly crying from relief, she ran towards the figure and stopped just short of throwing her arms around, whom she now knew to be, Morty, the Ecruteak gym leader.

"Well," he said, feigning exasperation, "If I'd have known you'd liked me _that_ much I would've written more often!"

"Oh Morty," sighed Gardenia, who was too busy catching her breath to retaliate to the remark.

The was a moment's silence then she said accusatorily, "Er, what's with the scarf?" It was flamboyantly purple. In the back of her mind she made a note that there was no breeze even though she could have sworn she had seen the scarf billowing in one only a minute ago.

"It's my new look, babe" he replied teasingly.

Gardenia frowned, "Well… I was just leaving now. It's late. So…" Just then she looked down to see the Leafeon looking up at her imploringly.

"Ah, I see you've made a new friend while I was away," Morty said, then went on to say, "Just one?"

Gardenia frowned at him some more, then they both simultaneously turned to leave the forest. Gardenia suddenly felts the spooks return and started into a sort of power walk so as to stay in front of Morty by a foot or two, though the Leafeon quickened its pace to keep up with her, she didn't care how stupid she looked in front of him.

Morty let her go on ahead then stopped and turned around to take in the sight of the forest before him. He had been planning on exploring the Chateau but Gardenia seemed a little upset and like she wouldn't mind some company. Just then, he caught something out of the corner of his eye in a distant tree. It was perhaps just a trick of the light; it was like a kind of shadowy distortion. And then it was gone.

Morty laughed softly to himself, perhaps a wayward phantom sprite of the Autumn Equinox? As a trainer of the paranormal type he was used to tiny niggling things like this that couldn't be explained. He turned on his heel and followed Gardenia.

After they were both long gone, a breeze played its way across the forest path and lifted up the leaves so that they danced in a spritely autumn waltz.


End file.
